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U.S. has worn out its welcome in Iraq

Submitted by gjohnsit on Tue, 01/08/2019 - 3:45pm

When the U.S. finally pulls it's troops from Syria they will go through Iraq. In fact, that appears to already be happening.
Not factoring into the Pentagon's equation is the political reality that all the stars are aligned to expel the U.S. from Iraqi soil for the final time.

The Sairon bloc of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, was the winner of the Iraqi elections in May 2018.

"This is a challenge to national will, a new violation of Iraq’s sovereignty and a bad behavior that reveals the ugly face of the American administration,” Hamdallah Rikabi, a spokesman for Sadr’s Sairoon bloc, said in a statement on Sunday....
"Our position remains the same in rejecting American policies that do not respect the sovereignty of nations, their territorial integrity and the dignity of their people," Hamdallah said.

It added that the Iraqi government should "reject this visit, inform the United Nations and call the U.S. ambassador in Baghdad urgently" while the group called "on all political parties to unite in the demand for national sovereignty and to put an end to the suspicious U.S. military presence in Iraq."
...
The Islah coalition also condemned Trump's visit, with its leader Sabah al-Saadi saying Wednesday that the Republican leader came "as if Iraq was one of his states." He called for an emergency session of the House of Representatives in order to "discuss this blatant violation of Iraq's sovereignty and stop these aggressive actions from Trump, who must know his limits, the U.S. occupation of Iraq is over."

Hadi al-Amiri, the leader of the Iranian-backed Fatah alliance, said that “the existence of the US troops is currently lacking any legal justification on Iraqi soil.“

"Trump must be aware that Iraq's sovereignty came with blood and not the building of bases in this country of resistance and martyrs. The government has a duty to expel U.S. troops as a violation of the country's sovereignty," Hezbollah al-Nujaba Movement spokesperson Hashim al-Musawi told Al Mayadeen, a Beirut-based outlet often critical of U.S. foreign policy in the region.

"The decision to withdraw U.S. troops belongs to the will of the people and its parliament, the resistance will force the United States to withdraw its troops from Iraq," Hezbollah Brigades spokesperson Jafar al-Husseini told the same outlet. "Leaders in the Iraqi resistance vowed to cut the hand that extends to neighboring countries including Syria. Trump's surprise visit to Al Asad base means he does not feel safe announcing his visit to Iraq."

Ah, Donald. You certainly have a way of uniting people. Who says that you can't bring people together against a common enemy?

@UntimelyRippd
...back when they had a US-friendly, relatively-progressive government firmly in place.

Whozzat again? Saddam Hussein?

'Hussein'???

Like Obama's middle-name???

WTF KIND OF BLIND, HATEFUL TERRORIST RATBAG TOOK OUR FRIEND AWAY AND WHY WEREN'T WE THERE WHEN HE NEEDED US?!?

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“Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark....Do not let the hero in your soul perish in lonely frustration for the life you deserved and have never been able to reach. The world you desire can be won. It exists.” ― Ayn Rand

Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya, Korea, Japan, Germany and others. Whenever US troops move through Eastern European counties they get protested. No one wants them, perhaps with the exception of Poland, who hates all of their neighbors, Germany, Ukraine and Russia, and dreams that the US will make them great again. Having US troops in your country is like having a really bad sinus infection, it never seems to go away. I can't see how this ends except badly. I suspect that the only cure will be economic collapse in the US, to the point that the US cannot afford foreign bases. Hard to believe that the US accuses other nations of not being part of the "civilized" world order. Perhaps more countries need to destroy countries, commit war crimes and kill millions of people all over the world and then station their troops there permanently. Then we will have achieved a world in the image of America.

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Capitalism has always been the rule of the people by the oligarchs. You only have two choices, eliminate them or restrict their power.

Erdogan has had just about enough of our so-called policies with respect to the region too. The idea that we would walk in and tell each of these governments, who have been in one way or another in league with Iran or with Iran's forces in Syria and Iraq, that now we need them to experience a war against Iran or just a war, against ISIS or against some newly named entity, is getting to be just a bit too much perfidy.

Just knowing Erdogan refused to meet with Bolton and stated Bolton made a serious mistake in his public comments in Israel is positive news for me.